


A Day in the Sun

by Wayward_WLW (Parker_Haven_Wuornos)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Destiel Wedding, M/M, Multi, Wedding Fluff, wedding fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 17:08:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29457240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Parker_Haven_Wuornos/pseuds/Wayward_WLW
Summary: They aren’t her dads. Claire’s pretty insistent about that, because she had a dad; Jimmy was her dad, so Dean and Cas are just... Dean and Cas.Except once at Cas’s bachelor party.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Kaia Nieves/Claire Novak
Comments: 6
Kudos: 78





	A Day in the Sun

**Author's Note:**

> Just a random thing I wanted to throw together in honor of the wedding. Thanks for reading!

They aren’t her dads.

Claire’s pretty insistent about that, because she had a dad. Sure, she has issues with Jimmy. She still feels a little abandoned, still thinks he was an idiot, sometimes she’s pinned with a rage so sharp and bright it scares her, just because she thought about the choice he made when she was just a kid.

But the rage passes, and she remembers that he was her dad, and for the first nine years of her life, he did okay at that.

(Now that she’s a hunter, she’s learned that having an okay dad for nine whole years is an anomaly in this business, something to be grateful for.)

Jimmy was her dad, so Dean and Cas are just Dean and Cas.

Except once at Cas’s bachelor party.

She’d had a bit to drink. She’d actually had a lot to drink, snuck carefully whenever everyone was too busy toasting Cas or dancing to notice what was in her glass. The world had gotten round and had started to spin just enough to make it seem more fun. She’d started dancing, clinging to Kaia with sweaty palms and swinging her around with abandon, her head thrown back while she laughs.

After a while they’d both sat down to watch the festivities, and Kaia had slumped over, her head in Claire’s lap, and Claire had stroked her hair and smiled at Jody and Cas dancing, making up for their complete lack of skill with sheer enthusiasm.

After a while even she had started to doze off, and that’s when Cas had come over, shaking her awake to help her back to the motel room.

She remembers swatting at his hand when he’d tried to help her stand. “’M fine, dad.”

The word had been like a bucket of ice poured over her head, launching her into something closer to sobriety.

Cas froze, his hand an inch from her arm. “Claire—”

She hadn’t known whether to try to laugh it off, or to pretend it hadn’t happened, but she’d been drinking, and suddenly that word had seemed so big and so _important_ and so _distant_ that there were tears welling up in her eyes, threatening to ruin the makeup she’d worked so hard to make look this careless.

Carefully, Cas stepped closer and put a hand on her shoulder, giving her plenty of time and space to pull away.

Cas didn’t smell like Jimmy, didn’t even really look like him anymore. He moves differently and talks differently, and when she leaned into him in that moment, he hadn’t hugged her the same way she remembered Jimmy hugging.

And that, strangely, was okay.

When she’d stepped away from Cas, still a little teary, Jody had stepped in, and then Alex had crushed in on her other side, and Patience, her extra senses dulled with alcohol, hadn’t even noticed Claire’s little misspeak, so she shouted “Group hug!”

And suddenly Claire was surrounded on all sides, and Cas is crushed against her, the button on his stupid coat pushing into her cheek hard enough that she thinks it’ll leave a mark.

Now all laughing, Claire’s mistake and outburst forgotten, everyone had filed out and back towards the motel while Donna began a joyfully off-key rendition of Piano Man that should have gotten them all arrested.

When she wakes up, it all comes flooding back to her, and Claire is left with the very firm reminder that _they are not her dads._

She leaves the crowd and the noise of wedding preparations to sit on the impala. As long as Dean doesn’t need to go anywhere, she’ll be left alone here, which is exactly what she wants.

She needs to think, get her head sorted out before she goes back in among the guests and the joy and the excitement.

“Claire?”

She looks up, afraid she’d somehow called him because she’d been thinking about him, even though he said it didn’t work like that anymore. “Cas.”

“Are you… alright?”

“Yeah.”

“You were drinking last night—”

Claire rolls her eyes. “You going to lecture me?”

He shakes his head, his eyes crinkling up at the edges. “No. How’s your head? I’m told sometimes there are headaches.”

“Fine,” She says, without bothering to tell him about the ibuprofen she’d already taken and would need to take again soon.

“Good.”

They’re silent for a minute, and a bird starts singing shrilly from a nearby tree.

“Last night—”

“Sorry about—”

They both stop and look at each other, but Cas gestures for her to go on.

“Uh, sorry about what I said last night,” She says, scuffing her foot in the dirt, refusing to look at him. _Jimmy’s face, Cas’s face. Dad’s face._

He seems surprised, from what she can tell without looking at his face.

“I wanted to apologize to you,” He says slowly, as if he’d had a speech prepared, but she’d already gone off-script.

“Why?” She asks.

“I… I’m not your father.”

Claire laughs a little raggedly. “I know, dumbass.”

He frowns at her language. “Really, Claire. I’m sure this must be… difficult for you.”

She laughs again, but this time there’s no humor in it at all. “That’s the problem,” She admits. “It’s not that difficult at all.”

He tilts his head, the funny, curious puppy dog look he probably should have stopped doing a long time ago. “I don’t understand.”

“Last night… I didn’t call you dad because you look like Jimmy,” She admits, looking away, trying to find the bird in the tree so that she doesn’t have to see his reaction to her confession.

“You…”

She shrugs, chewing on her nail. “I don’t know, I guess… you fill the void, or something.”

Cas nods slowly. “Family doesn’t end with blood,” He says, and it sounds like he’s quoting someone.

“Sounds like something Dean would say.”

“Something someone said to him.”

Cas leans into her arm, bumping against it just hard enough for her to know it was intentional, and waits for her to look at him.

When she finally does, he smiles. “I’m very glad you’re here. I don’t—I don’t have a lot of family left, and what I had wasn’t… ideal.”

“No one’s family is ideal,” Claire says, then has to pause to wonder if he’s seen the breakfast club, and if she needs to add that to the family movie night list.

“Mine might have been a little bit messier than most,” He says. “But… I want you to know that I’m very honored that you’ve let me be your family, Claire. It’s—”

“If you say some stupid bullshit about not deserving it, I’ll punch you,” Claire says, softening her words with a smile.

He puts his hands up, conceding the point. “Truly, thank you, Claire.”

She flushes, looking away and swallowing a sudden lump in her throat. “Yeah, uh, thank you, too.”

“For what?”

She shrugs, digging the toe of her sneaker into the dirt. “You came back.”

Carefully, Cas puts his arm around her, and she goes willingly, leaning against his chest.

“Sometimes I hate him, you know,” Claire admits.

“Claire—”

She doesn’t let him try to take the blame for Jimmy’s choice. “I hated him for leaving, but… if he hadn’t done it, if you hadn’t picked him… I never would have become a hunter. I never would have met Kaia or Jody or Alex or Patience or Dean or Sam. They’re my family too. I wouldn’t trade any of it.”

Cas nods. “Half the people at our wedding have tried to kill us. Dean and I have tried to kill each other. Love is very complicated sometimes.”

She laughs. She’s heard the stories, but it’s still hard to picture Dean and Cas fighting, aside from their snippy little arguments. They love each other; it’s clear as day. She can’t really make herself believe they’d ever hurt each other, even though she knows they have.

Not that it really matters. All’s well and all that.

“So…” She smiles hesitantly. “You’re getting married tomorrow.”

The smile that splits Cas’s face is so wide it seems to involve his entire body. The sun gets brighter, as if he’s turned up the saturation on the whole world. “Yes, I am.”

“Nervous?” She asks.

He shakes his head. “Why would I be?”

“People usually are, I think.” Claire hasn’t been to a wedding since she was a kid, when she’d been a flower girl in her mom’s friend’s wedding, and this doesn’t feel anything like that.

Cas shrugs. “There’s nothing to be nervous about. I love Dean, and he loves me.” He smiles, like the idea of that is still new and incredible.

“Glad you two finally figured that one out, it was getting a little embarrassing.”

Cas rolls his eyes, and Claire smiles.

“Are you ready?” He asks.

“For…”

“Your speech at the rehearsal dinner tonight.”

“Yeah,” She lies. “Absolutely. I have it all worked out.”

Later, she will run to Jody, with Kaia’s hand gripped in hers, and force them both to sit down and work out a speech with her.

(“ _How do I start?”  
_ _“Start with a funny story about him, or like, when you met or something.”  
_ _“Dearly beloved, we’re gathered here today to celebrate the angel who possessed my dad, and the man who didn’t think that was weird.”_  
“Okay, maybe not that.”) 

“It’s all ready,” She assures Cas. “But, uh, I should go practice.”

He smiles and hugs her quickly. “I should go find Dean.”

“Isn’t it bad luck or something to see him?”

“We’ve already had all our bad luck.”

It takes about four hours of work for her, Jody, and Kaia to get something usable onto the notecard. Claire isn’t sure that it’s perfect, but she thinks it’s as close as it’ll be, so when Kaia squeezes her hand as the rehearsal dinner is starting and asks, “Are you ready?” Claire smiles and says yes.

She steps up and takes the microphone from Jack, whose speech was his usual blend of baffling and adorable. He gives her n enthusiastic thumbs up, and she smiles back, taking a deep breath before she turns to face the crowd.

“Someone told me once that family doesn’t end with blood.”

Dean’s mouth drops open, and his eyes go glassy as he reaches for Cas’s hand. Claire has to fight around a lump in her throat to keep going.

“We can’t let it, in this job, because a lot of us lose our blood family.” Claire thinks about Jimmy and her mom, and family dinners that always started with a prayer. “And sometimes we’re mad about it. Sometimes we try to get revenge.”

She locks eyes with Sam and Dean. She knows their story, knows how it started.

Then she looks at Cas. “But sometimes it’s easier to let go of being angry and just… live. I’m glad I picked the other, because if I decided to get revenge on the angel that possessed my dad—” There’s an uncomfortable ripple of laughter through the crowd “—I would have missed out on the best backup family I could have found.”

She raises her glass to Dean and Cas. “You guys aren’t my dads, but whatever you are, I love you, and I’m happy for you. Congratulations.”

She manages to sit down and hide her face in a sip of champagne before the first tear breaks free.


End file.
